Media outlets have been engaged in 'fandom tourism' articles for some time. Although there are fewer articles these days demonstrating surprise that fandom or fanworks exist, there are still a number of fandom profiles that either serve to stoke fandom nostalgia by pointing out activity surrounding a particular canon, or by demonstrating surprise that works exist in a specific fandom. Some recent examples were run in Jezebel, Flavorwire, and The New York Times.

While the spate of fandom tourism articles may have been inspired by San Diego Comic Con (SDCC), other articles involved SDCC directly. In a post at Belief Net, Nell Minow discussed her participation in the San Diego Comic Con panel Fandom: The Next Generation. "We all dream of sharing our passions with our children. But it is important to be careful about it. Everyone on the panel had a story about sharing the wrong movie — or the right movie too soon — with a child who got upset, and feeling that we had 'flunked parenting.' Young children will say what they think you want to hear and if it seems too important to you, they will tell you they like something when they really do not."

NPR talked with screenwriter Nicole Perlman, who discussed her excitement at seeing fans of her next project. "Perlman says she got very excited the first time she saw someone dressed up as her new project, Captain Marvel. 'She looked fantastic, so I completely accosted her and I kind of whispered it shyly, 'I'm writing the movie, take a picture with me please!'"

Polygon contrasted the approaches of Marvel and Warner Bros when fans promoted their new projects. "When trailers leaked from Comic Con, because studios show things to huge halls of people who are all carrying recording equipment and still think they can control the footage, the response from Warner Bros. was, to put it mildly, messed up." Writer Ben Kuchera concluded, "The reaction to the Suicide Squad footage was mostly positive; this was a great thing for Warner Bros. until they had to stomp in and make sure we knew they didn't approve of the way we were excited about their product and everyone needs to cut it out at once or they'll turn this movie right around and drive home."

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The Daily Dot discussed Funimation's fanart stance with OTW Legal staffer Rebecca Tushnet. "'[I]t’s notable that there’s no mention of fair use...Fan art can be non-infringing fair use; elements of whether it is fair use include how transformative it is (how much new meaning and message it adds); whether it’s commercial or not; and whether it displaces a market for 'official' goods.' So it doesn't matter that they've declared they won't be going after commercially sold fanart? Not necessarily, according to Tushnet: 'It somewhat depends on what they actually do, but they are clearly claiming that fan art is in fact infringing copyright, even if they indicate they usually tolerate it. So I wouldn’t feel very reassured by this statement.'"

Perhaps JK Rowling's embrace of her fandom was key in a Fox Sports story about a fan whose fannishness influenced the University of Kentucky 2015 yearbook. "Towles has said that he's read each book in the series at least seven times and can 'quote the whole thing,' referring to the movies. And to take his fandom a step further, he annually celebrates Harry Potter's mythical birthday on July 31." The article concluded, "Harry Potter fan or not, you've got to appreciate the passion that led to...a yearbook titled 'Patrick Towles and the Order of Kentucky Football.'"

The Debrief reported on One Direction's new charity initiative, Action 1D. "Action1D is part of a brilliant wider campaign called Action/2015 which is all about the fact 2015 is the year loads of global issues begin to get resolved...What do Directioners need to do to save the world? Create pictures, videos, whatever, telling the boys what they want the future of the world to look like. Harry, Niall, Liam and Louis will then help put pressure on our leaders."

NPR featured a story on filmmaker Jennifer Nelson who is suing Warner/Chappell Music to make the song 'Happy Birthday' available for everyone. "If Nelson and her lawyers win, the song will be in the public domain. 'I think it's going to set a precedent for this song and other songs that may be claimed to be under copyright, which aren't," says [Nelson's lawyer]. As for Nelson, she jokes that if her lawsuit succeeds, 'People will be so sick of the 'Happy Birthday to You' song, because everybody will get to use it, finally.'"

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San Diego Comic Con (SDCC) season means it's time for the media to once again declare that fangirls exist. The New York Times thought this was the year for fangirls. "A bunch of oddballs — nerds and fanboys, toy collectors and cosplayers, gamers and fantasists — invaded the mainstream and planted themselves at the vital center of the entertainment industry...Lately, though, something else has been happening, too — a shift in the ecosystem of fandom symbolized not only by Sadness but also by another new addition to the Comic-Con costume repertory: Imperator Furiosa, the crew-cut, one-armed avenger played by Charlize Theron in 'Mad Max: Fury Road.' Furiosa’s presence amid the Disney princesses and Manga pixies is an especially potent sign of the feminism that is a big part of this event."

A more thoughtful article at Refinery29 points out that SDCC is hardly a bastion of feminism yet. "What we’re calling fangirls here covers an admittedly wide and amorphous group of women. They’re cosplayers, comic book collectors, sci-fi nerds, steampunk enthusiasts, booth babes, Lolitas, and more....And they are vocal: When the proportion of female writers and artists for DC Comics plunged from 12 percent to 1 percent in 2011, female fans started a petition for DC to hire more women. DC Comics responded by promising to try. Female fans from a group called the Carol Corps. were also instrumental last year in pushing Marvel to announce plans for a movie about Captain Marvel, a super-powered woman. In other words, fangirls are engaged and numerous, making up a significant portion of the audience that shells out hard-earned dollars to support their pop culture passions. And yet, despite that, this group remains the third estate of the comics / fantasy world."

The Chicago Tribune focused more on numbers. "'But when you start to break it down according to how fans identify themselves, we find that no individual fandom is that even,' continues Salkowitz, who will discuss his findings Sunday afternoon at Comic-Con. 'Comics, videogaming, hobby gaming and toy collecting are majority male, usually in the 55- to 60-percent range. Manga/anime, science fiction/fantasy and media fandom are 60- to 65-percent female. Because today's big conventions appeal to fans of everything, audiences coming to shows are pretty much gender-balanced. However, it's still the case that, say, 'comics' fandom tends more toward older guys, whereas manga appeals more to younger women.'"

As Neon Tommy pointed out, having female creators representing female fans in the media is a needed step forward. "As for today’s devoted fangirls — who have often been excluded from the full participatory side of media — Jarett says the 'Fan Girl' film's message is one of female empowerment. 'Telulah is a filmmaker,' he says. 'And being a fan of something can also be someone’s art — it’s a form of creative expression.'"

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Forbes hosted an article about cartoon fandom in Zambia and the difficulty in obtaining canon. "'It’s literally impossible to find anime DVDs in stores here,' said Banda. 'Also, the last anime I saw in a Zambian cinema was [Studio Ghibli film] Ponyo. So yeah, access is pretty rough.' Even today, DVDs and BluRay are Zambians’ only legal options, as 'streaming legally is pretty much out of the question,' Banda said, referring to Crunchyroll, Funimation, and other websites’ region locking for much of Africa. Since the local currency, the Zambian kwacha, is weak compared to the Euro, fans often obtain anime through piracy when that’s all they can afford."

Science Fiction.com wrote about a donation to the OTW's partner institution, the University of Iowa. "73-year-old Allen Lewis spent the last 20 years collecting more than 17,000 books. Many of them are in the science fiction and fantasy realm as Lewis sought to rekindle his childhood love for those genres. Lewis has been a sci-fi fan since he was 12...Many of Lewis’ books are first editions and first printings. His collection includes 30,000 signatures from authors, editors and artists." Don't forget that the Open Doors project helps fans arrange donations of fannish memorabilia to the Iowa collection, so contact them with questions about your own collection!

NBC Philadelphia was among those profiling the local furry community "Ward, who helps organize the local group, didn't identify as a Furry until 2008, after she graduated from Marietta College in Ohio. Like many local Furries, she found her way into fandom through its anthropomorphic artwork. 'It's kind of an all-or-nothing thing,' she said. 'You start going, they drag you to the convention, and that's it, you're done.' Around Pennsylvania, Furries congregate on one online forum, www.pa-furry.org, and a handful of Facebook and Twitter groups. Anywhere between a dozen and a hundred Furries, friends and family show up to the local events, which become more frequent in the summer."

The New York Times hosted a discussion about fannish nostalgia. "Alas, I will never be 9 years old in 1987 ever again, and though it’s fun to romanticize the past, I don’t want to mistake fondness for excellence...Much like my friendships with the other members of my Full House Club, whom I sporadically see in my Facebook feed with their own 9-year-olds, my fandom seems unsustainable now. Better, then, to let the children of today discover and obsess about their own TV shows. Don’t remake the sweet smarm of our youth. I’ll be fine without it. I can always read up on some Uncle Jesse and Uncle Joey fan-fic if ever I’m feeling sentimental."

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The Bookseller reported on Scribd's changes to its business model due to romance readers. "Coming in the context of Amazon's Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) Select's controversial new per-page payments...the news from Scribd may not raise independent authors' spirits. One key platform c.e.o., Smashwords' Mark Coker, refers to it as a 'purge'." The problem? Romance fans read too much. "All-you-can-read subscription programs...are predicated on the assumption that most subscribers will not use them, or at least won't use them with any serious regularity...The romance-reading community, famed for its high rate of content consumption, thus is like part of a fitness club membership overrunning the workout equipment, costing the service more, apparently, than is sustainable."

The Guardian also looks at romance and fanfic readers as a problem for the publishing industry, though less for reading too much than not reading enough non-romance. "Fiction Uncovered cleverly...turn[ed] Grey’s ubiquity to its advantage by launching the #BritishwritingisnotallGrey hashtag, in which tweeters could nominate favourite contemporary writers...'This is not an anti-Grey stance,' wrote Sophie Rochester, the organisation’s director, 'but the singular focus on the book this week is exemplary of an issue regularly seen – a fanfare of attention around one or two writers with many talented writers not getting the attention they deserve...The work is out there, was the message; we just need to support it. Publishers would no doubt counteract the argument by noting that off-the-scale successes such as Fifty Shades underwrite their commitment to all kinds of writing."

A University of Missouri journalism project sought to give female fans even more to read by launching a new gaming magazine targeted to them. "Fangirl hopes to become a bi-monthly printed issue along with an iPad edition. There’s a three-year plan to take the publication from online-only to print production. It might become a full-time gig for some of us, too. 'The School of Journalism gave me a chance to create my own job,' Morrison said. 'I never thought I’d be doing something like this when I came to MU, and while it’s sometimes horrifying, it’s also the most exciting and worthwhile experience of my career.'"

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Geek and Sundry suggested that Gaming Led Us All to Genderbending. "There’s a great deal of imagination and creativity behind genderbending in fandom, fan art, and cosplay, and it can help us identify more strongly with those characters we love. But where does it really come from? Where did we even get the idea to imagine our favorite fandoms with this random character change? While the interest in genderbending can come from a lot of different places, I think gaming had a huge part of making it more widely understood."

Eventbrite's latest fandom study examined con attendance and cosplay. "Con-goers are split almost half and half by gender, with males representing 48.7% of fans, and women making up 48.9%. Taking a closer look at these nearly-equal slices of the population pie, we see that single fans are divided by gender almost evenly as well: 50% of singles are male, and 47% are female. But while male singles head to cons alone (29%), the single ladies travel in groups (18%), and go for the cosplay."

Malaysian Digestreported that 1 of every 6 K-pop fans is male, but they're often quiet about it. "'I was showing to a friend a music video of Super Junior’s ‘Sorry Sorry’. I was expecting comments like 'wow cool dance moves' or 'it’s catchy', but NO, instead he said, 'why do you listen to this. It’s not like you understand a single thing that they say. Plus they look kinda gay. Are you gay?'...What I don’t understand is why does liking another music genre has got to do with sexual orientation?"

Attack of the Fanboy discussed the battling petitions related to the development of Metroid Prime: Federation Force and linked to a video highlighting the fan rage being expressed. "In just under four minutes, Mega64 skewers the mentality behind the Federation Force petition by taking it to an extreme that incorporates elements of Anonymous threat videos with a terrorist-lite militia. It looks like a hard sell on paper, but the over the top nature of every passing second works well on video."

Singer, producer, and Portlandia star, Carrie Brownstein sent out an Instagram message on how thrilling it was to meet B52's singer Cindy Wilson and the importance of fandom. "To this day I still am a fan, of many, many things. Fandom keeps me hopeful and engaged, a participant. And I was a fan last night in front of Cindy, rattling off a whole bunch of incoherent, half-strung together thoughts about her songs, her voice, her band, her brother. And it felt, well, awesome. I guess I'm sharing this because I'm on tour right now and I meet fans every night. Sweet and eager faces, sometimes desperate, sometimes nervous. Please know I'm grateful for all of it. And I understand it. I'm one of you."

A review of The Great Detective in The Boston Globe cited the fandom section as the most interesting part. The author met with many fans at different events. "At one of these (a dinner held by the Baker Street Babes), he meets a doctoral candidate in adaptation studies whose work focuses on the great detective. 'Sherlock Holmes is like the North Star of the culture,' she says, neatly summing up Dundas’s own implied thesis. 'Everything else swirls around and changes, but he is always there.'"

Author C.S. Pacat began her original novels for the Captive Prince Trilogy on LiveJournal before their commercial publication. In a leadup to the release of the final novel, she celebrated individual fan creators and their fanworks. After recognizing the works of several fan artists she added, "I (tragically) can't read Captive Prince fanfiction in case I get influenced, but I'm always so happy to know that people are writing it. I chose these three writers because they have written the three most popular works on Archive.org - so I know that they are writers that you all love."

A Newsarama article looked into how fans connect to characters and their developmental arcs. "Krasniewicz said the sense of ownership that comic fans feel toward their favorite characters is not unique to them. In fact, it's part of being human. 'This ownership or commitment to the universe that the fandom is built around is what humans do...We create these kinds of ties to real or fictional world's because that is how we make sense of the world. These commitments help us categorize and judge everything around us. It is amazing how much fictional universes can influence the everyday world.'"

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Gamasutra hosted a post about the preservation of gaming history. "The second event – the most relevant and sadly the one that got less coverage – was that EFF made a petition to the U.S. Copyright Office, requesting an exemption to allow for games abandoned by their companies – such as MMOs that no longer have servers online – to be legally maintained by the fans. That is a fantastic thing both for consumers and for the preservation of our history – either companies keep their servers up, or they are giving permission for others to do so. So it doesn't come as a surprise that the Electronic Software Association also contacted the U.S. Copyright Office, pressuring them to deny EFF's request, supported by their buddies, the Motion Picture Association of America and the Recording Industry Association of America – yes, those two also contacted the Copyright Office to pressure against the preservation of video games."

A post at Fansided suggested that it's not only the entertainment industries that don't have the best interests of fans at heart: technology companies also have an effect on fannish practices. "Look, if you’re watching the game at home by yourself...split your attention between your TV and your tablet/smartphone/laptop/whatever...But if you’re out in a public space that’s clearly meant to encourage a communal viewing experience, then put your phone away and be present in the damn moment." Exploring the pluses and minuses of tech use, writer Stu White adds "[Y]ou are told that by not participating in this second-screen culture, you run the risk of isolating yourself, of becoming an outsider, of becoming somehow deficient. Fears regarding outsiderness run deep, thus they are easy for brands to capitalize on. Are you worried about being isolated from the world? Then buy our product! We are the only viable path to connectedness and community."

On the other side, fans' loyalties may lie in interpretation. Writing about the new novel in the Fifty Shades of Grey series, The New York Times focused on how much 50 Shades fanfic is out there, as well as how much more satisfying readers might find it. "At this point, Ms. Fougner, who has published the equivalent of five novels totaling some 3,500 pages, has written far more about Christian and Anastasia than their creator has. 'I prefer her writing to E. L. James’s writing,' Ms. Brueggemann said...Another one of Ms. Fougner’s devoted readers...said that she read 'Grey' when it came out on Thursday and found it lacking compared with Ms. Fougner’s version. 'I know ‘Grey’s’ going to be a letdown for me...I’ve already read it through Emine’s eyes, and I honestly don’t think E. L. James can touch her version of Christian.'"

Trek Movie was among those who interviewed a fan who pitched their TV series idea to Paramount. "Michael Gummelt, owner of www.StarTrekUncharted.com (formerly www.StarTrekBeyond.com) and creator of the fan concept of the same name has been invited by Paramount to pitch his idea for a new Star Trek television series to the network, an unprecedented opportunity rarely (if ever) afforded to non-industry professionals. The concept, now titled Star Trek Uncharted, has been in the works for 20 years and takes place several decades after the time of Captain Kirk and the original Enterprise."

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OTW Legal Staffer Rebecca Tushnet was among those interviewed for the new fandom documentary, Fanarchy. Fan Film Folliesreported that it will premiere on July 19th, 2015 on the network Epix. "Fanarchy explores the rise of fan culture and the ways in which modern fandom is challenging the Hollywood system by becoming a creative force in its own right. Questions are raised about copyright, intellectual property and the concept of originality in a re-mix culture."

Another fan documentary premiered recently on the BBC. In When Pop Ruled My Life: The Fans’ Story "[t]he presenter’s murky past helps this enjoyable documentary explore the question of what drives small fanatics, but the beauty of the programme lies in its affection for the fans. Take, for instance, the Iron Maiden devotees – now white-haired men – who named their children after band mascot Eddie and now chuckle about their wives leaving them. Or the Bay City Rollers extremists who still turn up to reunion shows in tartan Rollergear, with the word 'Les' embellished on their backs in diamante."

Movie Pilot released a post highlighting the many fanart responses to the character of Yarny in the new Electronic Arts game, Unravel. "[P]erhaps due to the cuteness of the character alone or the excitement and nervousness of its director Martin Sahlin, the internet and video game community immediately fell in love with the little guy."

Entertainment Weekly promoted the MTV fandom awards, noting the new categories this year. Eligibility for at least one of them, "Fandom Army of the Year" would seem to be dependent on having a recognizable fandom name. Perhaps this is why celebrities seem to be increasingly involved in these choices, either by weighing in on different options or outright soliciting official descriptions.

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An article in The Telegraph discussed how fan speculation in sports fandom is a form of fanfic. "At the heart of fan fiction’s appeal is a sort of wish fulfilment: a subtle remaking of the world in which one’s wildest fantasies can gush uncontrollably to the surface. And while a good deal of fan fiction is sexual in nature, much of it is just quite sweet: charming teenage reveries that begin with a single pleasant idea – 'wouldn’t it be nice if'...In a fortnight's time we see the opening of the transfer window, and yet despite the two being ostensibly unrelated, it strikes me that there are certain similarities between the millions of stories that teenage girls tell each other on Tumblr, and the millions of stories that football will tell itself over the next three months. For the reopening of the summer window marks the ceremonial point at which football subtly shifts in character: from a real game played on the pitch, to a fantasy enacted largely in the imagination."

Salon discussed the focus on women in the new season of Halt and Catch Fire. "This season...has an exuberance the first season struggled to reach, and it’s because of a storytelling device that has more popularity in fan fiction archives than Hollywood studios: the gender swap. It’s a thought experiment that pops up in fervent fandoms, ones that are also eagerly reimagining beloved characters in different settings or with new adventures...As with so many elements of fandom, it’s casually subversive—a re-creation that grapples with the social construction of gender and imagines its infinite fluidity. And as with so many elements of fandom, it is a long-standing tradition—one that Shakespeare made regular use of in his plays, which itself was a commentary on the fact that all the female roles were played by men."

A guest post in The Japan News explained cover dancing which "is a fun activity in which teams of dancers emulate the moves of Japanese or South Korean idols as they dance to the original music. Spectators cheer for them as if they were the real deal. While cover dancing is gaining more and more fans in Japan, I’ve often met fans in Thailand, Hong Kong and nearby areas, as well as in the United States and Latin America. I think cover dancing is similar to fan fiction for anime and manga in dojin culture, in which fans create their own works using popular manga and anime characters."

An article at The Guardian discussed academic analyses of fan activities on Frozen. "Fan responses have boomed on the internet and given rise to myriad readings. In fact, academia now lags behind fans when it comes to subjecting popular culture to intense analysis. The online debate about, say, Mad Men could sustain a conference for weeks. 'Fan studies talks about how carefully and critically audiences discuss texts...The internet has made fan responses so much more mainstream and accessible.' In the past, she says, you would need to do focus groups to yield similar information. 'I think the way in which it’s been really popular with traditionally marginalised communities is specific to Elsa’s characterisation...It can resonate with people who have been ostracised or stigmatised.'”

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